Podcast links 'Women' to new outlets
SAG mediating gap between legit and online b'cast
Currently in an eight-week run at Gotham's Kraine Theater, the improvised Off Broadway serial might easily have been dubbed as legit. But now that live installments are being recorded and podcast on the Web, the Screen Actors Guild has stepped in to rep the performers and the show has entered a middle ground made possible by advances in Internet technology.
True to its hybrid nature, "What Women Talk About" -- which mounts a new hourlong installment every Tuesday night -- began life as a traditional film. In 2004, producer-directors Hugh Sinclair and Wayne Perillo were shooting a script called "What Men Talk About" when they noticed that the outtakes of the four female cast members were funny enough to stand on their own.
The women soon came together for several short stints in 2005 at various New York theaters, improvising the lives of their "Sex and the City"-style characters. Audience reaction was so strong that they agreed to come back for the formal run at the Kraine.
That might have been the end, with Sinclair and Perillo happily filling their 65-seat venue and recouping their $9,000 budget. But Perillo says he soon saw how the piece could expand. "In the first year, we were getting a considerable return audience," he says. "And we were getting emails from people asking ... what they had missed in last week's story."
The producers wanted to tap auds who were interested in "Women's" ongoing plotlines but couldn't make it to the Kraine (like Perillo's friends in Chile, for instance). A friend in the film industry suggested the directors podcast each episode, meaning installments would be available for on-demand downloading to computers and devices like the video iPod.
Using digital video cameras they already owned, Sinclair and Perillo began filming and editing the current run, posting installments to iTunes and their Web site, whatwomentalkabout.com. With production costs of $200, the first seg was podcast on Feb. 3.
And this, Perillo claims, is when the show became impossible to define. "It really falls between every crack you can imagine," he says.
First off, Actors' Equity doesn't oversee unscripted work, so the theater union is not involved with the production.
Meanwhile, though SAG has exercised jurisdiction over the podcasts -- cast member and co-producer Lauren Seikaly is a SAG member -- their involvement is still being negotiated. "I'm not sure what kind of contract we'll end up signing," Sinclair confesses.
Neither is SAG. "What Women Talk About" was originally considered for an "interactive contract," an agreement that covers programs viewed via Internet streams. But a SAG rep says the interactive contract is "still finding its way," and as its parameters evolve, it may prove a bad fit for Sinclair and Perillo's show.
In fact, SAG has no definitive statement about how "What Women Talk About" would be classified. "Discussions," says the rep, "are still ongoing."
And those discussions could prove especially tricky, since the show is arguably a film, a sitcom, an Internet broadcast and a piece of theater.
But whatever it is, "What Women Talk About" is certainly a harbinger of how podcasting technology is altering entertainment. With costs so low and access universal, the Net might see an explosion of similar material. That could require an industry-wide revision of how we define what we're seeing. "I'm not sure what kind of contract we'll end up signing," Sinclair confesses., "They've sent us all sorts of paperwork."
